Manchester Medical Orchestra 14 June 2014
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) – Don Giovanni, K. 527: Overture (1787)
Andante – Molto allegro
Background
The legend of Don Juan (Spanish) seems to have originated in a 1630 play, El burlador de Sevilla y convidado de piedra (The Trickster of Seville and the Stone Guest) by Tirso de Molina. Dozens of versions of the story exist, though Mozart’s opera remains among the most famous. Most share similar core themes of the Don as a libertine, serial seducer of women, gambler and killer. Mozart, in partnership with librettist da Ponte, wrote his version between Le nozze di Figaro and Così fan tutte. The overture to the opera, in a remarkable display of procrastination, was composed the night before its première, which itself had already been postponed twice.
After failing to seduce Donna Anna, Giovanni kills her father. His womanising and treachery continue until he encounters a talking statue of the dead man in a cemetery. He invites the statue to dinner, and is later consumed by flames after refusing to repent his sins.
The music
The terrifying first bars and slow introduction hint at the eventual supernatural confrontation at the climax of the opera, as well as at the villainy of the Don himself. A major key Allegro quickly follows, which instead portrays a more loveable rogue, a ‘dashingly reprehensible’ figure. It is in this vein that Richard Strauss composed his Don Juan symphonic poem in 1888. Although the Overture ends in a sunny D major, it is impossible to forget the introduction, which shapes our expectations of the opera to come.
Further reading and listening:
Sadie & Macy: The Grove Book of Operas
Daniel Harding conducts the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra: www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxdsFilOSQs
Upcoming Don Giovannis: www.bachtrack.com/4001/find-events/work=8230
Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) – Symphony No. 104 in D major, H.1/104, ‘London’ (1795)
I. Poco sostenuto – Vivace
II. Allegretto
III. Presto and assai meno presto (trio)
IV. Allegro con brio
Background
Following the death of the music-loving Prince Nikolaus Esterházy in 1790, his son, Anton, quickly disbanded the court orchestra, whom Haydn had led since 1761, in the interests of frugality. ‘Papa Haydn’, as the musicians had affectionately called him, suddenly found himself free to travel and perform as he pleased, with a generous pension from the court. He was urgently and shrewdly sought by the London-based impresario, Johann Salomon, who contracted the 58-year-old Haydn for an opera, six symphonies and a number of other works. The pair arrived in London on 1st January the following year to a grand welcome, and the symphonies 93-98 emerged to great acclaim over the following couple of years. After a brief return to Vienna, the next six London symphonies were premièred in 1794-5, culminating in the 104th and final symphony, now referred to as The London Symphony, at a triumphant benefit concert, ‘Dr Haydn’s Night’, on 4 May 1795. The great composer later noted that ‘The whole company was thoroughly pleased and so was I. I earned 4000 Gulden from this evening. Only in England is such a thing possible’. Such a thing in today’s terms would be roughly £30 000.
Thus, ironically, Prince Anton’s austerity measures led to the production of some of the best-loved music of the age. Further, after Anton died in 1794, his successor Nikolaus II reformed the court orchestra, to which Haydn returned as Kapellmeister. He did not turn his pen to the symphony again, instead moving on to choral music. Michael Kennedy suggests that composer knew that he could not better the symphony, and so Haydn signs off from the genre he did so much to develop in the same D major in which he started.
Once I had seized upon an idea, my whole endeavour was to develop and sustain it in keeping with the rules of art. In this way I tried to keep going, and this is where so many of our new composers fall down. They string out one little piece after another, they break off when they have hardly begun, and nothing remains in the heart when one has listened to it.
Haydn on melodic thrift
The music
The first movement opens, like all but one of the other London symphonies, with a slow introduction, here in D minor. Meditative string interjections follow bold chords, which recall the opening chords of Mozart’s Don Giovanni overture, and which will in 1824 form the opening notes of Beethoven’s final symphony.
With Haydn at the zenith of his reputation and powers, his enthusiasm and brilliance for spinning a simple idea into a whole symphony is neatly exemplified in the 104th. The opening statement of the Allegro which follows the introduction thus hints at the opening of the remaining three movements:
From this simple melodic idea, initially falling and then rising optimistically, an entire symphony is born.
The movement is in the usual sonata form: the first theme is heard twice (in different keys) in its exposition (which is itself repeated), so as to reinforce its memory in the mind of the listener. The ensuing development takes the third and fourth bar of example 1 above and toys with them in various guises. Specifically, flattening the penultimate note of the example by just a semitone immediately twists the music into the key of B minor and leads it through some fierce violin passages. It takes a giddy, almost wild few bars of chromatic ascent to apply the brakes. The recap of the first tune restores order, and the coda ends the movement by transposing the last two bars of example 1 so that they triumphantly restate the home key of D major.
The second movement has occasionally been treated as a semi-tragic slow movement in the romantic tradition, but its tempo marking (Andante, ‘at walking pace’), vigorous middle section and lively triplets and dotted rhythms make a strong case for a brisker approach. The movement is in A-B-A form, with the two outer sections in the now familiar D major and the central passage utilising Bb major and G minor. There are prominent solos for principal flute before some sparkling chromatic counterpoint between violins and woodwind softly closes the movement.
The bucolic Menuet is based around a vivacious figure which bounces off accented chromatic off-beats, creating impressions of a music box or merry-go-round. The trio is oddly hesitant and ambiguous in its opening unison oboe and violin notes, as the D and F natural could herald either D minor or Bb major. The latter is opted for, but only briefly, as the sweeping quaver figures hint at a number of other keys. Resolution back to the menuet itself comes after a mysterious bridging passage.
The main theme (below) of the Finale was for many years thought to have been inspired by cockney hawkers singing ‘Hot cross buns, hot cross buns’, or ‘Live cod, live cod’. This has since been refuted in favour of a far more likely source, the Croatian folksong Oj, Jelena (below). The similarity between the two can leave little doubt as to Haydn’s inspiration:
Oj, Jelena
Oh Helena, Helena, apple green
Under her the grass and clover is growing,
Jelena the fancy girl, cut it,
With the golden sickle, with the golden sickle,
with the white hands,
What Helena cuts, she puts in front of the horses,
Eat, drink, eat, drink, my brother’s horses.
Tomorrow you will wander far, far away,
On a new road, new road, to get my sister-in-law.
There is a breathless urgency to much of the movement, apart from three momentary passages of respite. Haydn gives his bassoons challenging quaver passages of equal agility to the strings, and several loud outbursts for brass and timpani. The final pages charge furiously towards a thrilling conclusion.
Further reading and listening:
www.laphil.com/philpedia/music/symphony-no-104-london-joseph-haydn
Gerald Abraham: The Concise Oxford History of Music: Haydn’s Last Symphonies
Mariss Jansons conducts the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra: www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffBK-EYjs90
Forthcoming Haydn in Manchester: www.bachtrack.com/find-concerts/composer=2302;city=18
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) - Symphony No. 7 in A major, Op. 92 (1812)
I. Poco sostenuto – Vivace
II. Allegretto
III. Presto and assai meno presto (trio)
IV. Allegro con brio
Background
The vast majority of Beethoven’s orchestral output was produced in his ‘middle period’ (c. 1803-14). The period began with his writing of the ‘Heiligenstadt Testament’, a letter to his brothers in which he notes his suicidal ideation due to encroaching deafness, but resolves to live for the sake of his art. Though a decade apart from the seventh symphony, it is well worth reviewing (right) at a medics’ concert such as this.
Beethoven was beset by health problems again in the winter of 1811-12, but managed to focus his energies on the seventh symphony. It is a work as distinctive as his other best pieces, chiefly characterised by the repeated rhythmic patterns which propel each movement along. No programme note for this symphony would be complete without the cliché of Wagner describing it ‘The apotheosis of the dance’. This did alarm some early listeners, though. The critic Friedrich Wieck remarked that it must have been composed in a drunken state, composer Carl Maria von Weber identified the bass line of the 1st movement coda to signal Beethoven to be ‘Ripe for the madhouse’, and conductor Thomas Beecham likened it to ‘A lot of yaks jumping about’.
Interestingly, just as Haydn’s London symphonies were ironically an indirect product of austerity measures, Beethoven dedicated his seventh symphony to a banker, Count Moritz Fries, as thanks for his musical philanthropy.
The music
In the classical style of Haydn, Beethoven begins with a slow introduction to the first movement. In this instance it is uncommonly long, and makes excursions into the distant keys of C and F, perhaps pre-empting their prominence later in the symphony. A few bars of tit-for-tat between flute and violin precede the arrival of the Vivace, the music suddenly taking on a bouncing rhythm in the memorable first theme. The irrepressible rhythmic propulsion of the movement owe a great deal to the dotted ‘Amsterdam’ rhythm, marked in the third bar of the example, which occurs in almost every bar of the movement. The ‘Dam’ of ‘Amsterdam’ seems to bounce boisterously on to the next beat, whilst the short ‘Ster’ provides a skipping sensation. It is a simple idea, but used so extensively makes for one of the most energetic passages of music Beethoven wrote.
After a repeat of the theme above, a tempestuous development exploits the familiar rhythm to the point of brutality. A feature of this symphony, arising from the technicalities of 19th century horns, is the stratospherically high pitched writing for the instrument, requiring prodigious skill and stamina from the two players. It makes for a powerful effect, reinforcing climactic moments such as the coda of the first and final movements. In the former, they peel triumphantly after a hard-fought search for A-major resolution.
The Allegretto second movement has been particularly famous since its first performances, when it was immediately encored. Like the equivalent movement of Haydn 104, approaches vary dramatically. As a general rule, more recent, ‘historically-informed’ performances have favoured a brisker pace, adding a certain element of terseness to the atmosphere. Again, insistent rhythms (long–short–short) form the basis of a simple theme (above), which is extensively repeated and embellished. A contrasting, altogether more lyrical second subject appears to offer some hope, but is quashed by an unsettled return of the theme above.
Such was the popularity of this movement that it inspired Eugène Lami’s 1840 watercolour (below), Andante de la Symphonie en La, in which Parisian concertgoers are seen “taking possession of their inwardness”. Among the audience appear to be a dog, a variety of bizarre facial contortions and, on the right, a somnolent Anton Bruckner.
The third movement scherzo romps along at a quick pace. It uses the F major key first predicted unexpectedly in the opening minutes of the symphony, and thus recalls the Pastoral F major Symphony No. 6. Prominent use of solos for flute and oboe give a birdsong quality to the music. A contrasting, slightly slower and reverential passage in A major, based on an Austrian pilgrims’ hymn tune, appears twice. In keeping with the folksy atmosphere, Beethoven frequently employs drone basses through the central passage, and again later in the symphony.
A whirling finale is heralded by two thunderbolts, followed by whirling violin melody (below), which, by coincidence, is remarkably similar to an Irish folksong Beethoven was arranging at the time of composition. Once more, clear rhythmic repetition is obvious. Joyous horn and woodwind outburst punctuate the whirling theme. Further forays away from the home key are attempted, and it takes a large fortissimo, all bounding horns and flying bows, to drive the dance breathlessly back into the home key. The music plunges on, though, with the string sections bouncing a single bar of the above excerpt between themselves. Finally, a searing triple-forte (exceptionally rare for Beethoven) and further horn heroics take the symphony to a galloping close.
From the Heiligenstadt Testament
‘...For six years I have been a hopeless case, aggravated by senseless physicians, cheated year after year in the hope of improvement, finally compelled to face the prospect of a lasting malady (whose cure will take years or, perhaps, be impossible)...
‘I was compelled early to isolate myself, to live in loneliness... and yet it was impossible for me to say to men speak louder, shout, for I am deaf. Ah how could I possibly admit such an infirmity in the one sense which should have been more perfect in me than in others, a sense which I once possessed in highest perfection... what a humiliation when one stood beside me and heard a flute in the distance... but little more and I would have put an end to my life - only art it was that withheld me, ah it seemed impossible to leave the world until I had produced all that I felt called upon me to produce, and so I endured this wretched existence - truly wretched... perhaps I shall get better, perhaps not, I am prepared...
‘As soon as I am dead if Dr. Schmid is still alive ask him in my name to describe my malady and attach this document to the history of my illness so that so far as possible at least the world may become reconciled with me after my death...
‘I speak from experience, it was virtue that upheld me in misery, to it next to my art I owe the fact that I did not end my life with suicide...
Further reading and listening:
Barry Cooper: Beethoven – Immortal Beloved (1811-12)
The legendary Carlos Kleiber conducts Beethoven 7 with Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw Orchestra:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Sw97NzvvsE
Forthcoming Beethoven 7th symphonies:
www.bachtrack.com/4001/find-events/work=60;country=1
